Navigating the judicial ship through stormy waters: President Esther Hayut and the Israeli constitutional crises, 2018–23

Abstract Attacks on the Supreme Court of Israel (SC) are neither new nor rare, but the rolling series of constitutional crises that Israel has been enduring is unprecedented. In recent years, the populist movement has been eroding Israeli democratic order, and Israel has seen constant clashes between the executive and the legislature (which, to a great extent, can be viewed as one authority rather than two separate ones) on one side, and the Court on the other. In this article, we examine Justice Esther Hayut’s tenure as president of the SC. We argue that Hayut devised well-thought-of judicial strategies that enabled the judiciary to maintain and potentially enhance its power vis-à-vis the other branches of government. Under Hayut’s leadership, the SC managed to uphold the rule of law and the democratic nature of the state of Israel, most notably through her greatest legacy: the unprecedented and bold implementation of judicial review of constitutional statutes.